Word&Way Voices

Much has been written lately about our subtle, invisible idols. These false gods manifest themselves when we put our politics above the gospel, the U.S. flag above the cross or our cultural assumptions above the values of Christ’s Kingdom.

It was the thirteenth time I preached the “May Meeting” at this lovely church. I’ve watched as their membership shrinks each year. I want to be of help to them, but I live nearly 500 miles away. It is unlikely my preaching there three or four times a year will bring much change.

Churches throughout the U.S. are dealing with transition. When younger generations of people attend, they typically only attend half as often as everyone else, and they want their relationships to intersect with multiple other aspects of their lives, not just within the walls of a church building.

Transition is not new for God’s children.

Many Christians forget that Easter is not a one-and-done celebration, but rather the beginning of a season called Eastertide, a time that lasts until Pentecost Sunday (this year, May 20).

Earlier this winter, 48 years and one week after my younger brother Dennis died from injuries sustained in a car accident, my two siblings and I, along with our families, made a memorable trek to north Missouri. It began as a journey. It turned into a pilgrimage. Something holy took place. It was life-giving, emerging out of tragedy and loss.

Last year, I was in a meeting with Rev. Paul Msiza, the South African pastor who is president of the Baptist World Alliance. In a Q&A session with some church leaders, he mentioned that pastors in the U.S. might want to consult the Kairos Document (KD) issued in 1985 by a group of mainly black South African theologians in response to the vicious and demeaning policies of apartheid.

One of my favorite movies of 2016 was a science fiction film called “Arrival.” The movie follows a linguist and a physicist who are brought in by the U.S. military after alien ships appear on multiple continents around the globe.

Have you ever met a Veruca Salt in real life? A person who thinks that the world revolves around them and everyone in the world exists to make them happy or to fulfill their needs?

As believers, we wonder: Do we dismiss holidays like Valentine's Day that have very little relation to our modern Christian walk, do we go all in and enjoy the holiday silliness for what it is, or do we go somewhere in the middle?

The arrival of radio as mass media in the early twentieth century was heralded by many sincere Christians as a gift of God for propagating the gospel. Suddenly, there was a means of communicating God’s message of redemption with large audiences.